Yeah, if would have been better if Naruto learned his element plus jutsus, Jiraiya did that with Yahiko, Nagato, and Konan when he trained them. I get that he wanted to teach Naruto how to control the 9 tails power but if Kishi made it so Naruto could use it no prob (only up to 3 tails) then that would have been good because we could see Naruto fight using that power in his own way. I wanted to see Naruto use those hair jutsus Jiraiya uses for a shield, to shoot hair needles, and to grab and then impale his opponents jutsus as well.
End result should have been Naruto using his clones to speed up his progress (Jiraiya knows what shadow clones can do), have Wind and a second element, some of Jiraiya's jutsus, control of version 1 1-3 tails mode, and everything else Jiraiya already taught him. Kishi could have shown other characters on missions so we could see what they could do and introduce the other villages early on so he can show other characters and make the story more interesting. Could of had Akatsuki recruit more members in the time skip so they had much more people and show other villages fighting them in different situations.